Ber Rating & Insulation...how much does it affect value

c.p.w.g.w

As the title asks...

How much does the level or insulation & Ber Rating have a property...

I have been waiting since the middle of Covid19 to get the insulation upgraded on the existing house, but due to various reasons it keeps getting rescheduled...

But we are currently considering selling up and buying a new house...

My quandary is...do I go ahead with getting the insulation done or not...if everything goes well we could be looking at being outta here with 6-12 months, if things don't go well it could 18-24 months...

So I'm trying to balance the costs and benefits?

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Atlantic Dawn

It generally will make the property easier to sell but the amount you put in is highly unlikely to be made back in the sale of the house. Sell as is would be my advice.

Cake Man

What would be considered a decent BER rating? Like it's fairly obvious an A would be the best and G would be fairly awful but what would be a good "middle ground" so to speak? Is there a certain rating you'd be expected to bring a house up to when buying?

Ray Palmer

it really isn't worth doing if you are selling. The cost won't be recouped in the sale. It is really a long term investment on the property you are going to have. You won't see the benefits of it. Different if you were staying for longer and you get the benefit of the insulation and also the benefit on sale price. One thing is insulation installation will be more expensive going forward but also labour is very expensive now. I wouldn't bother if I were you.

Emma2019

You'd be better off spending the money on repainting in a neutral colour and selling.

You pretty much never recoup the cost of structural works and the person who's buying may not care or may want to rip it all out to do a deep retrofit.

Pomodoro

Having recently bought a house, I found myself subconsciously associating a house BER rating with how modern it is. Of course that was silly. A C BER rating can be achieved some very cheap measures like attic insulation and LED lightbulbs. So you could try and improve the BER before getting it assessed with a few cheap upgrades.

To be honest though, it's not like buyers can be choosers at the moment, so its even debateable if the small amount you spend here will make a difference. As other posters have said, how you "stage" the house (fresh paint, clear out anything that clutters / makes the space seem smaller) could make a bigger difference.

When I was looking, the well staged houses that looked good superficially went for a good bit more than almost identical houses that needed a lick of paint.

Deagol

I've talked to several estate agents who say that BER rating is something that many people look at and on average (note the word average), each letter difference (i.e. D-C, C-B etc) is worth something around €3k-€6k depending on house value initially.

c.p.w.g.w

Well a neighboring mid terrace house recently went for €200,000, it was B3.

I don't know what Ber we have, since we moved in, we put in a whole new gas heating system were we had no functioning heating system when we bought, believe the Ber was D or E at time of purchase, we are end terrace so I'd like to hope we could achieve at €200,000(would be 100% increase on our purchase price in 5 years)

Caranica

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118598036#Comment_118598036

Very little of that increase will be down to the heating system/BER though

Jmc25

Personally I'd stay away from very low BER ratings, not so much because I think it would cost a lot to improve them, just moreso I take it as a sign the property hasn't been well looked after over the years.

I also probably wouldn't pay any extra for a C1 vs an E1. A B rated property would definitely be more attractive, on average, than a lower rated one for me. And I would definitely pay a premium for an A rating.

But that's just me, such is the market you'll shift a freezing G rated house no problem anyway.

Emma2019

The BER is also a tick box exercise. I'm living in a "G" rated house which is a million times warmer than any house I've ever lived in before. We have the heating on 3/4 hours a day max in the current weather.

Woman I bought it from had the windows done a few years back and some insulation put in but didn't have certs for it so the BER couldn't reflect that.

Also how much direct sun your house gets makes a huge difference too.

I'm glad this thread is here. I'm considering selling my house this year, bought it as C3 BER and I won't be getting anything else done to it. I've put in a double glazed porch on front door , replaced double glazed rear doors, replaced upstairs bedroom windows, LED lights, new Smart meter controls and insulation. That's it.

Its really in need of a fresh paint and I wasn't going to bother but actually just got a decent quote today on painting so I'm definitely doing it now. I'm in an area that's in high demand and prices are rising steadily. Its really mad as the price doesn't reflect the actual value at all, just lack of supply. I've bought and sold about 5 times in my lifetime and have learnt that you never get back what you've put in, in terms of decor and fittings anyway, and BER isn't an issue in a housing crisis.

We are currently in the process of buying a C1 rated house. If house had a A1-B3 rating, we could get the AIB Green Mortgage at 2.1% interest rate. I wonder should we push to improve BER rating before we sign contracts?? It's the difference in €50 in our mortgage weekly!

To answer the first poster's question, it's definitely more attractice to buyers to have a better BER rating for the above reason alone.

Ray Palmer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118603955#Comment_118603955

I don't think anybody said it wouldn't increase the value of the house. The question is is it going to increase the price to make the expenditure worth it. Reality is it will increase the value of the property less than the cost and the person buying benefits not the seller. From a sellers point of view it isn't worth it